Gym raiding, network error

I've been running into the ultimate gym defender a number of times now.

Network Error.

Some verified observations:

• You are able to finish one battle before it occurs
• You're unable to finish a second battle
• After a few minutes it's reset so that you can finish one battle...
• after which the error comes back again

Anecdotal observations:

• The problem tends to happen at gyms you've finished a boss raid at during the same day
• The problem is gone the next day

Be wary of the anecdotal obervations. As a player I'm a being of habit just like most players. The gyms I raid (not boss raids) are quite often the same gyms. Ie my home territory, which means the error could very well be tied to the gym rather than being keyed to a boss raid.

I don't know a fix, if any. If you have infinite time you could just run one battle, restart the game and wait a few minutes. Eventually you'll go through the gym unless someone comes by and inserts a new defender. This is a real risk as you'll see the ten minutes lockdown come and go long before you've cleaned out the gym. In any case it'll take you at least the same time as tearing down a well built level ten tower of days gone by.

High Level Pokemon Go, redefining the entry level from 30 to 32

When I started this blog I placed the entry level for playing some kind of high level Pokemon Go at level 30. That needs some changing.

Now, this isn't a blog trying to keep up with trainers as they progress through levels, so the change doesn't mirror that aspect at all.

Rather the entry level I've set should mirror some kind of average aggregate of candies and stardust gained. That total should enable the trainer to play Pokemon Go in a way that's different from how it's played at lower levels.

A few things have happened that invalidates level 30 as the entry point:

• XP bonanzas
• Boss raids

XP bonanzas usually boost xp intake, but rarely do they increase the stardust gained per hour played.

Boss raids pump up XP by the thousands. In the case of legendary bosses a full 10 000 XP per raid. This totally trashes the XP to stardust ratio. By using the free raid pass and doing nothing else a player will go from 30 to 32 in just above three months.

What happens is that my articles about line-ups become irrelevant for trainers around level 30 as they're stardust starved to a degree that wasn't the case as late as April 2017.

So, without further ado. The entry level for high level Pokemonn Go is hereby increased from 30 to 32. That's an increase from a total of 2 million XP to a total of 3 million XP.

Legendaries, what are they good for

We've had access to four of the legendaries for a while now. To begin with we can't assign them as defenders to a gym, which means we're talking dedicated attackers.

From a usefulness perspective I'd rank them the following way:

• zapdos
• moltres
• articuno
• lugia

Zapdos

It's got the same stamina as ampharos and a little better defence to further bulk it up. While zapdos' defence lags a little behind jolteon's the huge difference in stamina between zapdos and jolteon makes zapdos the clear winner as a tank.

Zapdos comes with a higher base attack stat than both ampharos and jolteon.

Zapdos has access to better movesets than ampharos, but jolteon comes in ahead with Thunder Shock and Discharge.

I'd say that jolteon remains the best attacker against gyarados, but its poor bulk has zapdos come out ahead against any target with only a single weakness against electric type attacks.

Zapdos makes ampharos obsolete as an attacker, and would usually be the goto electric type attacker for any trainer who has yet to build one.

Configure your zapdos with Charge Beam and Thunderbolt.

Moltres

Moltres has such a huge lead in stamina compared to flareon that the lower stamina doesn't matter. As a tank moltres is superior to flareon.

Moltres has a slightly higher base attack stat than flareon.

Moltres and Flareon share the optimal fire moves, Fire Spin and Overheat.

Moltres is a better flareon than flareon. Having the bulk to run right through a defending grass type pokemon makes all the difference.

Configure your moltres with Fire Spin and Overheat.

Articuno

Articuno outtanks all the usual ice-type attackers. Lapras is still a better tank however.

Articuno comes with a better base attck stat than lapras, piloswine and cloyster. For all practical purposes articuno obsoletes these attackers.

Jynx is a superior ice-type attacker compared to articuno, but it comes at the price of a huge discrepancy in bulk.

Since lapras is a grade A defender, articuno does a good job at replacing it as an attacker. Basically building an articuno will free up a superb defender to place in gyms.

Configure your articuno with Frost Breath and Ice Beam.

Lugia

Lugia basically doubles the bulk of alakazam and espeon, if not even better. Comparing lugia to those two from a tankiness perspective isn't even fun. Even exeggutor is easily outtanked.

Lugua comes in far behind both alakazam and espeon in terms of base attack stat. Exeggutor also has a solid lead here.

Lugia makes up for some of its poor attack value compared to exeggutor due to the latter only having access to Psychic as a charge attack.

Alakazam runs in circles around lugia for the short time it stays up in battle, and espeon also leaves lugia in the dust.

The main problem with alakazam and espeon is that you need two of them.

For the player with a limited line-up, and who has yet to build a psychic type attacker, lugia functions as a work around to fix that problem for half the cost.

Configure your lugia with Extrasensory and Future Sight.

Gym raiding, speed burning

Going into a gym three or four raiders is quick business as it is, but you can speed up that process anyway.

This is a trick for cleaning out a gym with six iffy defenders in a few minutes.

Let's say you're three people.

After the first mon is defeated one player drops out and starts anew. The two others continue.

After the pair going through the gym defeats the third defender one drops out and starts anew.

By the time the first player to drop out catches up with the player who continued through the gym, probably on defender number five, three defenders should have been ousted.

While the sixth defender is being attacked defender number four gets ousted and that player starts the second attack on defender number five.

The two players downing defender number six have to cope with a white screen and are unlikely to rejoin combat until defender number five has been downed a second time.

They clear it out and catch up on the second battle with defender number six. All three players burn it down, rejoin battle and remove that defender.

Each player selects a defender and drops it inside without having to synchronise battle winner priority.

A berry each and onwards to the next gym.

Zapdos tomorrow

Just a reminder. New bird incoming.

That either means raid as a maniac today, because you really, really want a good moltres, or get prepared for the electric bonanza.


The golem I hope you've beefed up for moltres will work perfectly well against zapdos as well. So will that Bite / Stone Edge tyranitar.

Be careful with your omastar if you have one. You'll get electrocuted.

Did you ever pump up that Jynx in preparation for taking out solo dragonites? Well, now's the time for it to shine.

You might have gone bonkers and slapped some CP into a piloswine, or even an articuno. Bring it forth. Just be wary of electric attacks against the articuno.

While having abyssmal base attack stat, lapras still works as an anchor. Think of it as a very shoddy version of vaporeon against moltres.


Notably you'll do a lot less damage compared to when fighting moltres, and you'll take more since fire is ineffective against rock whereas electric attacks are neutral. This is just a reminder for those who mix up the ground and rock types.


As you're likely to notice your team of super effective attackers shrunk substantially, so it's time to dig out those general dps.

Dragonite, gengar, espeon and alakazam all have a place here, with dragonite being the bulkiest in the gang. I recommend that you save the three squishy ones for when you're well over a dozen players. When you have the DPS to barely but safely handle the boss, slot in dragonite for better survivability.

Gym territory, intelligent solo feeding

When you're feeding mons alone you need to rethink your feeding strategy.

The limitations:

• Max ten berries to a pokemon per 30 minutes
• Max ten defenders fed per 30 minutes
• You receive a limited surplus of Golden Razz Berries from boss raiding

I've had great success in attacking a string of gyms with the same well known player slotting in defenders in each of them.

Hammer one gym twice, leave, hammer the next twice and leave. Check the game to verify ten fully restored defenders.

Clear out the third and fourth gym.

As a defending player you want to avoid this.

The solution:

• Feed blissey and snorlax only
• If both aren't present, add lapras or vaporeon
• Always feed two defenders

Observe that this is when you're the only one responding to the defensive need of a gym.

If you're more than one player with mons present in the gym then you can pick two each and keep them up. Let the crap inside burn in hell, and trust me, there will be crap inside unless you built the gym from scratch during a gym raid.

Did you read that?

Pick two each! Don't strangle your ability to feed more gyms by feeding four a berry every second battle.

If you stick to the two defenders per gym then you're able to defend five gyms. Until you run out of berries.

The thing with territory isn't to keep a hundred percent strangle hold over every gym. Those days are gone, well unless you're six players physically sitting on a group of gyms your refuse to yield.

Territory is about creating conditions during which rival players simply refuse to attack your gyms. You keep them during night, or during office hours, for example. There has to be an easily identifiable pattern, or else your rivals won't learn.

When the conditions are fulfilled you just keep feeding berries to gyms under attack, and only for two defenders.

Sure, if your turf is exactly one gym then by all means feed everything, or feed five each in the two gyms that make up your territory. Otherwise stick to two.

Benefits:

• You can defend more gyms
• Most casual attackers simply give up when they see blissey and snorlax return to full capacity even once
• Even though weaker defenders will get knocked out you're almost certain to keep the gym up for the ten minutes after which friendly players can start adding defenders to the gym once again
• You're not depleting your Golden Razz berries at an insane rate

But don't forget to yield to a raid. With three or more players hammering into a gym the only thing you'll get for your effort is more bag space. There's no way a solo defender can handle that kind of attack.

Sure, test them by feeding the two strongest defenders once. Sometimes people just give up, but if they're persistent then drop it.

Boss raiding, moltres, handing out extra balls to new players

Since Moltres is an absurd squishy for being a legendary raid boss it's also the easiest boss for a few hard core players to pull new players through.


If you live in a largeish city you can probably just skip this post. Players of all kinds swamp the raid and the boss burns down immediately.


Now let's assume that you're playing in an environment where getting enough players to take down Moltres is definitely not a problem, but getting the team contribution bonus is more or less a random event.

If you're two or three hard core players with the time and potions to spare, here's a tip to make new players happy players.


Group the newbies by colour and have the smallest group join the lobby. Join yourselves. Almost burn the boss down and leave the battle. Pocket your phone and make sure they succesfully burn through the last part.

If the second group is big enough to clear the boss with one of you hardcores missing, then that player could just as well finish the fight together with the first group.

Repeat with group two and three.


Now everyone present should receive the team contribution bonus, possibly with the exception of you hard cores, but then you're probably going from raid to raid and can afford to run with seven or eight balls from time to time.


Happy hunting for more active players in your area.